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Finland resists EU bailouts by recent vote; EU to eventually collapse

By Jason on April 18, 2011

“We won’t allow Finnish cows to be milked by other hands,” European Affairs quoted Timo Soini, the leader of True Finns, himself a veteran member of both the European and Finnish parliaments — but who runs as an anti-establishment candidate.

Tea Party-like politics may be arriving in Europe.

That is how some European political analysts and commentators are interpreting the results of Sunday’s parliamentary elections in the Scandinavian nation of Finland, where a right-wing populist party made big gains by running against more European Union bailouts for the mostly Mediterranean countries swallowed up by debt.

One veteran analyst, Joseph Fitchett, the editor of the European Affairs blog, called the results “a political tsunami” for the European Union.

While politics across Europe have been drifting rightward since the 2008-09 economic crash, the Finnish elections were the first where a populist party got its boost not just from fighting rising levels of immigration, but from saying “enough” to EU bailouts for Greece, Ireland, and now Portugal.

A party called True Finns vaulted from relative obscurity to gain 19 percent of the vote and boost its representation in the 200-seat parliament from five to 39 seats. That outcome is likely to put the True Finns into a new government coalition, which is expected to take a harder line against Euro bailouts. Source: PBS Newshour (1)

Why are the Finns so resistant to bailing out Europe?

Somebody HAS to say ‘when’; even if the pillars of heaven totter, because the way things are going the ship is going down anyway if we continue like the over-educated clown now running things in Washington wants to do, and simply pretend that everything is fine and let’s just go on borrowing money FOREVER. All we have left now is bubbles of one sort or another. Most of them now deliberately propped up by the ‘leadership’ we are supposed to trust to protect our interests.

The EU won’t survive in its current form and the PIIGS WILL default at some point. Hopefully the Finns and then the Germans later will simply say “No, let the banks and their shareholders bite the bullets.” Let the ‘people’ decide before more assets are pissed down the bottomless well.

As Finns, they are used to not being “bailed out” by anybody. Look at the Soviets who came to invade them in 1939: the “allies” gave many speeches, but no real help, so, alone with a smattering of international volunteers, 100,000 Finns vs. 1.5 Million Soviets went toe to toe. Losses? 25,000 Finns, and almost a million Soviets. As one Soviet General said after: “we gained just enough ground to bury our dead.”

It was a horrible time for the Finns since a third of their trade was dependent on the Soviet Union. Unemployment spiked to 20% and GDP fell 13%. They were on their own but pulled their way out. They didn’t moan about feeling slighted by the world either.

This is a highly transparent society with little corruption compared to Greece, Portugal, Spain and Italy. It’s no wonder they feel chagrined by having to bail out these notably corrupt political cultures. It’s endemic in Greece where an audit by the government on a large hospital in Athens found 45 salaried gardeners but NO GARDEN.

The story of the winter war is one of awe, good reading if one has the chance. The other euro countries would do well to understand the frustration of Scandinavians about this bailout of their economies. As they say in the Sami, “Our God carries a hammer, your god got nailed to a cross of wood” Yes, cutting back your economy is going to hurt, but this is the way of it. Stand up and take responsibility.